Eyes of Hope
by nessieh-42
Summary: One shot of tragic, gothic love story between Erik and Christine. WARNING! Very dark...


**Okay, Lovelies. This is a little darker than I usually write, but this had been sitting on my computer for ages and was begging to be posted. This started out as a school project, but turned into this wonderfully tragic piece of work.**

 **BTW: _Maldoza_ is Chichewa for _Phantom_ , so just a play on words. Everyone else's names are the same.**

 **WARNING! No true happy (guy gets the girl) ending here! If you do not like that, do not read.**

 **Enjoy!**

* * *

I, Christine Daae, hoped that my seventeenth birthday would be the most wonderful day of my life. I had woken up that morning, glowing with anticipation. My maids smiled at that way that I danced around my room before breakfast, just brimming with happiness. That day would be the day that the love of my life would come and ask for my hand in marriage just like he promised he would.

"Look at her, Mary. She is just glowing. There is no other way to describe it."

"I noticed, Jinny. Now, get the little dancer over here so that we can get her ready for breakfast with her father."

Clad in my favorite white day dress, I joined my family in the breakfast hall. My younger twin sisters, giggled and stared at Father like they were in on some great secret.

"What are you two giggling about? Did you leave a mouse in your nursemaid's bed again?"

"No!" They both said, then they looked at Father again. He cleared his throat, and looked at my mother.

"A gentleman has approached your father . . ." I squealed in joy.

"Thank you! Thank you! Thank you! Erik promised me–"

"Erik? No Erik has not come to me today. Lord Raoul D' Chaney has asked for your hand in marriage."

My heart sank into a deep depression. Erik has not come? And Lord Raoul, the monster who everyone says killed his first three wives, has asked for me?

"Christine, look at me," my father commanded, "As I was saying, I accepted on your behalf. Lord Raoul and I are already discussing marriage–"

I covered my ears and screamed, running out of the room. My birthday has not even begun and it is ruined. I threw myself on my bed and sobbed, ignoring my maids' efforts to comfort me. My door flew open and my father yanked me to my feet.

"You will marry Lord Raoul D' Chaney. Imagine what this marriage will bring to this family, will bring me. Respect, dignity, and maybe even money. I will hear no more of Sir Erik Maldoza, you will marry Lord D' Chaney before the summer's end."

With that, he left me to my tears and grief. I did not leave my room or eat anything my mother sent up to me. As the sun set, I cried myself into a painless sleep, escaping my nightmarish reality.

A clinking sound woke me when the night was at its darkest. It came again and again, until I got up and opened my window. Seeing my midnight guest, I grabbed my shawl and ran through the memorized halls to the side door.

Erik caught me up in my arms and held me as I sobbed out my terrible tale. He stroked my hair and whispered comforting words in my ears.

"What can I do? Father will not refuse the match, not when he gain from it, and Mother will not stand up to oppose his decision. I cannot do anything."

Erik let me go and held my hands. "Run away with me."

"What?"

"You heard me. Run away with me. Did we not always of going to America and starting a life together there away from here. I know I can get tickets and I have enough money to get us started in America. All you need to do is say yes."

I was speechless. My dread and sorrow fled in this burst of hopefulness. I could escape everything, and start entirely anew with the man I loved. I nodded and threw my arms around Erik's neck.

There in the fading starlight, we ran away to a new life.

It took some time for Erik to make arrangements, but those days were filled with happiness and joy. Day by day, hour by hour, my love washed away my fears and my doubts with the adoration and bliss he lavished on me. Finally the day came when we could leave everything, but at the same time, everything went wrong.

At the port, Erik was talking to a sailor about our luggage, when a pair of arms grabbed me. I tried to scream, but one of the arms moved and covered my mouth. I was pulled away kicking to a carriage and thrown inside. I tried to get out, but the doors were locked, and nobody saw me because the windows were closed. I screamed and pounded on the doors and windows.

The carriage drove for hours, until it finally stopped and the door was opened. My father stood there, stern faced and cold. He dragged me inside an unfamiliar estate and led me to what appeared to be the study. He threw me into a chair. The angry man before me was not the man I had learned to call Father. He yelled at me and struck my face, chastising me for the humiliation that my disappearance had caused him, how he could no longer show his face in polite society again.

"You will be staying here, under guard, at the Lord D' Chaney's estate. You will stay here until you are legally bond to the lord, and no longer can cause any trouble. Hopefully, Lord Raoul can whip that mule-headed spirit out of you."

"And who did I get that spirit from?" He slapped me again, fear clenching my heart.

"Do not talk back to me, woman!"

With that he stomped out of the room and never turned back. I was left alone with the grave, solemn servants of Lord Raoul D' Chaney.

I prayed and hoped that my love would come and rescue me from this dungeon, but for days my prayers went unanswered. Thankfully, my jailer was away during my imprisonment, but when I heard that he was coming back, a darkness in the back of my mind, an evil side that I never knew existed, gave me an idea to rid herself of this tormentor. From the teachings of the numerous servants, I had discovered that Lord Raoul drank a glass of sherry every night after supper. The plan came easily to my mind. The happiness that filled me was wonderful. I would be able to marry Erik and be free for evermore. The night that my fiancée returned, I slipped a deadly draft into the ever so loved sherry bottle, and then I waited.

I retired to my bedchamber when I heard the carriage rolling up the drive.

"I am getting a headache, Millicent. I think I shall go to bed and greet the lord in the morning." Without question, the silent maid helped me ready for bed and left the darkened bedchamber.

Not long before midnight, I awoke from a terrifying nightmare. A storm had been raging, and I was caught in the howling gales. In the darkness, I groped for some security to clasp. my hand found a chiselled stone. A flash of lightening revealed that it was a tombstone, and another shed light on the name. I cried out in disbelief. The stone read Erik Maldoza. Tears of terror and despair ran down my cheeks. Heart-broken, I yelled into the storm and the wind blaming it for my suffering. My cry was cut off by two hands around my neck. They lifted me off the ground. Hooded Death itself held me. Desperate for air, I struggled for a single breath. A gush of wind threw the hood of Death back. A scream echoed through the storm as the face that was revealed was the face of Lord Raoul.

Gasping and nerve racked from head to toe, I bolted up in my bed. My scream did not bring any servants barging into the chamber. I threw back the blankets and walked to the table opposite the bed, and lit a single candle. Outside, a storm raged, blocking out any comforting light, but that single candle held back complete darkness between flashes of light. The flickering of that single candle abated my hysteria, and lulled me back into sleep's oblivion.

At breakfast, I was surprised and terrified to see Lord Raoul join me in the dinning room. He chatted about frivolous things, but otherwise paid no mind to his nervous bride across the table, who fought not to make eye contact.

After afternoon tea, a grave butler informed me that Lord Raoul wished to see me in his study. Gathering a little courage, I followed the silent butler through the darkened halls to two large, craved wooden doors. Inside, sat my fiancée holding the sherry bottle in front of the large glass-pane window. He did not accuse me, he merely rang a bell. Two burly man dragged in a limp body and forced him to stand upright.

A battered and bruised face looked up. The dark figure that had stood in front of the now covered window, walked over to the restrained man and started to talk.

"You know, I was the one who told your father where to find you. My first wife more than willingly came to me, but the other two ran, almost exactly like you, with lovers that would have abandoned them at the first opportunity. I broke that trust, and they became mine."

Out of his pocket, he pulled a hunting dagger and started to play with the tip. "I am a very jealous man. I hate to share anything with any other man, especially a beautiful young woman's heart. I wanted you the first time I set eyes on you three years ago, but I was married and you were too young. I bided my time for three long years. Conveniently, my previous wife died giving birth to give an already dead child, and you bloomed into a beautiful, young woman, ripe for the picking."

The beaten man turned to me, as I stood in the opposite corner. A pair of hands held me back as Lord Raoul spoke calmly to Erik.

"Now only one things stands between me and what I want. A lowly knight and his frivolous words." The knife flicked and a new cut bled on Erik's chin. "Who thought that he could simply run away with what is rightfully mine" –another on his arm and his neck – "What an idiot." He cut Erik once more, and I screamed for the tormentor to stop. Lord Raoul stopped and looked at me.

"Yes, darling, I think this entire affair should stop," and plunged the knife into Erik's unprotected chest. I screamed as part of my own heart died with Erik who lay on the floor, his life-blood pouring out of his chest. The arms holding me let me fall and stumble to Erik. I gathered my love into my arms and tried to keep him with me.

"Erik, my love, stay with me. You cannot leave me here to live without you."

My dying lover reached up once more to touch my face. "Live, Christine. I will always be with you." With one final shudder, Erik's hand fell and breathed his last.

All light was now gone.

The next few day passed in a flurry of activity. I barely remembered being guided down the aisle and saying "I do,"and even less of the dark nights I shared with my new husband. All I could think of Erik dead in my arms, the man who had showered me in love and showed me true happiness. Even those happy, joy and light filled days and nights were being eclipsed by the darkness of my dark and terrible reality.

Then, a few blurry weeks after that hurried ceremony, a messenger came to the estate, informing me that my husband, who had left on some business a few days after our wedding, was killed in a robbery in the dark alleys of Paris.

How could everything turn so dark? I sat in the corner of the dimmed church after my deceased husband's funeral. Once a place of comfort and peace, now a location so dark and sinister that it only made me feel cold. A chilling wind swept through the open doors. I prayed for just one comforting word from anyone. They had all left me alone in my pain and sorrow. All of my friends avoided me like I was cursed, and I was. I had lost my love and now was a young widow with no comfort to turn to. With no more tears to cry, I, an experience-aged widow, walked out of the church, the bells tolling behind me.

My physical tormentor was gone, but he was always there in my dreams, killing and hurting me or Erik over and over again. The empty house so full of hate and secrets offered no refuge from the shadows and demons. Eventually, I sold the large estate and bought a new one far from the places of nightmares and terrible events, trying to create ones that were once again happy and joyful.

Months later, on the darkest day of the year, my agony ended and a small, pink, squirming bundle was placed in my arms.

"It is a boy, m' lady. Ought to be like his father, with lungs like his. What will you name him?"

I lay back and surveyed my child, whom I dared not love. My first and last child. My only child. I was about to thrust it into the arms of the wet nurse, but the infant opened his eyes. I started to cry, and tightened my grasp on the tiny newborn, and lifted a prayer of thanks. The child had bright blue, hopeful eyes, the exact same eyes as the man whom I had loved and lost.

"Erik. His name will be Erik."


End file.
